


Sounds of Silence

by Starbuck09256



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Angst, after This is not Happening, pre-deadalive
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-05
Updated: 2020-08-05
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:14:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25737130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starbuck09256/pseuds/Starbuck09256
Summary: Dealing the aftermath of Mulder funeral Scully tries to continue on. A car ride with Doggett reminds her of everything Mulder.
Relationships: Fox Mulder/Dana Scully, John Doggett/Dana Scully
Kudos: 14





	Sounds of Silence

She closes her eyes and rests her head against the window. Everything is wrong. The smell of the car that doesn’t mingle with his aftershave, the pull of the car as it jerks to a stop. She hears the door open and shut, still not right. Not quite hard enough but not soft either. He would have closed it differently. He would of leaned over, brushed the hair out of her face and smiled, even with her eyes closed she could feel the smile on his lips. Lips that she hesitantly kissed, passionately devoured. Lips that will never brush her cheek or body again. It’s not Doggetts fault, she knows this. Finding Mulder in that field and having her world shatter around her. She hears Doggett open the gas cap. The way he leans against the car is wrong. Mulder would be near her window tapping his fingers against his leg. She feels the car dip as Doggett gets back in the smell of his coffee filled with sugar, not black and robust with fumes that remind her it’s only 9:30am plenty of time for coffee still. She misses Mulder so much it hurts, every part of her body and mind ache with space that he filled. The fact that Mulder would have bought her a coffee too, even if she was sleeping and an extra bottle of water because he knows that planes dry her throat out. They pull out of the gas station and the jerkiness of the car gets to her. The fact that it is silent is deafening her senses. The clicking of the turn signal that Mulder barely used. The fact that she doesn’t hear sunflower seeds being cracked won’t ever hear that same sound again causes her eyes to well up. Her baby rolls slightly inside of her as if it knows the pain of her sorrow. Knows how she plays recorded tapes of his notes at night to help lull them both to sleep. A sob rips through her throat as the tears fall down. Doggett startled by the breaking silence looks at her. “I’m sorry, it’s umm.. Hormones..” she mutters chewing on her lip to distract her from the feeling of Mulders ghost fingers brushing her tears away. 

“It’s ok to talk about him, you know. I think it helps.” Doggetts voice is too low, too soft, and his accent is still so unfamiliar. 

Talk about Mulder? How do you talk about someone whose presence was so integral to yours that it’s hard to breathe in the air when you know he can’t? How every single thing you see or do reminds you of a moment you spent together? How the flutter in your stomach taunts you with the knowledge that even though you still have a small piece of him it will pale in comparison to the real thing? She swallows hard against the rising taste of her tears. 

“It’s just, the car is too quiet. Mulder was always talking or eating sunflower seeds.” 

She shifts letting the familiar sounds resonant in her head. She sniffles, “Mulder told me when he was a boy and would wake from a nightmare he would hear his dad cracking sunflower seeds and it always made him feel safe, that sound… I guess I never realized that it made me feel safe too.” 

She looks out the window blurred and watery at the landscape that could be from any moment in the last 7 years of her life. A life that at times she both hated and loved. She loved the adventure, the mystery, now though she hated it. She hated watching trees and houses speed by. She hated that her and Mulder never got to have their home together. She hated seeing happy families on billboards because who could ever compare to Fox Mulder for her? Doggetts voice comes through as a misplaced cough. She doesn’t turn to see him grip the wheel tighter. But his voice is soft when he finally speaks, trying not to disturb the silence in the car. 

“When my son.. Luke died. Barabara and I uh couldn’t drive through tunnels.” 

The tremor in his voice is familiar like hers like anyone who talks about someone they loved so much that the sheer thought of their memory fills them with such sheer sadness. She waits for him to continue. 

“When he was little we would drive through tunnels and go “tuuunnnnneellllllll..” and he thought it was the funnest thing. Every tunnel, even tiny overpasses.” she hears him sniffle slightly. 

“A few weeks after the funeral, I uh made a wrong turn had to go through the one on 85 and Barabara just sat next to me and in the saddest whisper I’ve ever heard said “tunnnnelll” and as soon as we were through we stopped the car got out and cried. I don’t even know how long we were standing there in the mud and the rain splashing against us until we were soaked to the bone. I remember thinking that there couldn’t possibly be enough water in my body to shred at how much I missed him and that’s why it must be raining. And it’s like that in cars still, the silence can be so loud you hear your heartbeat and it makes me think of the wasted heartbeats I had with him. Barabara still doesn’t go through tunnels, she will drive 40 miles out of the way just to avoid it.” 

She hears him wrestle a napkin out, the sound of his nose blowing. 

“We went to counseling, and talking about him helped. So if you just want to tell me about Mulder, I’m here for you. Because a pain like that doesn’t go away or diminish... it just becomes part of you and sometimes the only way to handle the silence is to speak about the moments that were anything but.” 

She looks at him then turns to see his red eyes that match hers. It’s not the same nowhere near. She can’t imagine losing their child. Even Emily was so far removed from her own knowledge and experience it wasn’t the same. She picks up his hand, so different from Mulders and squeezes it releasing it just as quickly.

“I uh.. I lied to you Dana when we first met.” his eyes bore into the steering wheel as he swallows part of his confession. 

“Noone ever said anything about him not trusting you, he never had confided in anyone in the secretary pool. One agent I remember asking “what do you know about agent scully and mulder?” and you know what she said? She said. “They are soulmates, anything that describes them as less than that is a lie.” I wanted to put you off your guard, wanted you to be mad so I could see what you really knew, what the game was and you were just as defensive as I expected but also so very broken, like not a whole person, and I realized she was right… and that my actions were the worst thing I could of done at that moment in time and I’m so very sorry it ended this way, but if you tell me about him maybe just maybe it will help.” 

She sighs as her eyes close again. Thinking to herself how do you describe someone who challenged everything you knew? Showed you a world beyond the imagination? She pulls herself straighter, adjusting her jacket that barely fits with her stomach stretched with Mulder's child. She’s done sharing. 

“I think I should just try to rest until we get there Agent Doggett.” 

She lays her head back against the window as the sky opens up and rain stats to splatter against it. It’s not silent anymore and in her mind she can hear the soft crack of sunflowers seeds.


End file.
